When aspiring young rapper MC Truth walked into the lobby of Makin' Kash Ultra-fast Records all he could think about was how his socially conscious lyrics were gonna change a world full of police beatings, racism and poverty. As he sat sippin' some purple stuff from the styrofoam cup that the flirty receptionist with the bangin' body had handed him, he was oblivious to the fact that in the basement below the office a team of mad scientists was conducting mind control experiments. Although he walked in as MC Truth, three months later he exited as MC Killa, gangsta rapper extroidinaire...

Through the years, "MC" has stood for many things in the Hip Hop vernacular from "master of ceremony" to "mic control" but based on what is passing for "real Hip Hop" in 2012, does MC really stand for "mind control?"

Just ask yourself, when a Lil Wayne song comes on the radio and you start bobbin' your head hard enough to give you whiplash, is it because the music is that hot are you the victim of what Professor Griff of Public Enemy calls The Psychological Covert War on Hip Hop?

Over the years, various researchers have claimed that the feds have been doing psychological experiments on US citizens. In his book, 63 Documents that the Government Doesn't Want You to Read, Jesse Ventura presented documents that he alleged exposed such government mind control projects that began in the early 50's as BLUEBIRD, ARTICHOKE and MK ULTRA.

Also, Alex Constantine in his work, The Covert War Against Rock, suggested that the CIA program, Operation CHAOS, used the mind altering drug LSD as a way to destroy the anti-Vietnam War Movement of the '60's. It must be noted that LSD was also used by rock artists who had the potential to influence public perception of government policy during that period.

Since rap music has the potential to influence the masses politically, could similar tactics be used against the art form to neutralize political movements, today?

Remember back in April 2008 Blender Magazine claimed that Alicia Keyes told them that "gangsta rap was a conspiracy to destroy Black people," an allegation that she denied a few days late,r claiming that she was misquoted.

Maybe "the Chronic, Ecstasy and Sizzurp are the LSD of the Era of Terror? Could that be the reason that gettin' wasted is promoted so heavily in Hip Hop ?

The possibility is there.

According to hygenic scientist and metaphysian, Dr. Phil Valentine, author of the upcoming book, Cosmic Codex: Book of the Earth, "they studied the beats of rap to entrain the heart and brain. It's easy to put ideas in people's heads once you tap into the rythm of the heart beat."

Historically mind manipulation has not only been used to suppress political dissent, but to make a buck, as well.

The idea that subliminal seduction could be used to hawk goods goes back to 1957 when Vance Pickard released an expose' that "exposed the psychologically manipulative methods that marketers were bringing to advertisers," according to Martin Lindstrom in his book Buy-ology. Lindstrom also wrote that the man who coined the phrase "subliminal advertising" was James Vicary who, supposedly, conducted an experiment where he used a tachistoscope to place images inside of a movie, seducing people to have a sudden urge for Coke and popcorn.

However, when you start messin' with people's minds, the results are many times tragic.

Dominic Streatfeild in his book, Brainwash, reported that in 1986, a family sued CBS records following the suicide of their son after listening to the Judas Priest Stained Class album because, allegedly ," the suggestive lyrics accompanied by the music's loud repetitive beat had a hypnotic effect on susceptible individuals." The accusation being that the suicide was a result of "hidden messages" or subliminal seduction.

During the late '90's, Three- 6 Mafia, whose record label just so happened to be called Hypnotized Minds was blamed for starting riots whenever their hit, Tear tha Club Up was played.

Whether these "conspiracies" are real or not is debatable but what cannot be denied is the power that Hip Hop has to influence behavior.

According to Steve Stoute in his book, The Tanning of America, Hip Hop marketers used the process of "codification conveyed via a language and infrastructure built on the same pillars that create governments and religious institutions and global economies."

Why else would Advertising Age Magazine report in a March 8, 2005 article that Mickey Dees was going to pay Hip Hop artists to shout out the Big Mac in their songs?

Also, the question becomes if Jay Z and Kanye have to put a warning message on their video for Paris that it might "trigger seizures" what else could it be triggering inside your head? Maybe they are using a Hip Hop version of what is known in music as a "ghost note" to deliver subliminal vibrations to your subconscious mind.

Then again, maybe I'm just being paranoid. Perhaps Rack City is the best rap song ever recorded? Maybe Waka Flaka Flame is the greatest lyricist of all time?

What ever helps you sleep at night, buddy.

As Kwame Ture once said "our task is not to make the unconscious, conscious but to make them conscious of their unconscious behavior."

Back in 2004, Jadakiss released one of the most important songs of our time; Why? The song was so powerful because it made Hip Hop question the social, political and economic realities of society. Hip Hop must always challenge us to never accept things at face value without investigation.

Let's be clear. There is a battle going on for control of your mind. And you will know that you lost the moment you stop asking Why?

TRUTH Minista Paul Scott's weekly column is, This Ain't Hip Hop, a column for intelligent Hip Hop headz. He can be reached at info@nowarningshotsfired.com. His website is NoWarningShotsFired.com Follow on Twitter @truthminista

Monday, March 19, 2012

Fred G is texting his homie, Shady Grady making last minute plans for his birthday as he places his fitted NY Yankee cap over his freshly done braids. After wipin' down his brand new pair of kicks he makes sure that his skinny jeans are saggin' just right as he gets ready to hit the club. That is, right after he drops his grand kids off at the babysitter and slides by the drug store to get his Viagra. After all, its not everyday that you turn 60...

More than 30 years since its birth Hip Hop is experiencing an early middle age crisis. It is increasingly hard to tell the difference between a veteran rapper who has been in the game for twenty years and one who was born in the 90's. What Chuck D once called the "CNN of Black America" has now become, to borrow from Slick Rick, a "children's story."

It is time that we seriously ask the question, "Should Hip Hop have a mandatory retirement age?"

Anytime 16 year old Diggy Simmons, is spittin' better lyrics then grown men twice his age, something is terribly wrong.

Neely Fuller in his book, The United Independent Compensatory Code/System/Concept , wrote that a child is "regardless of age in years, any person who is helpless in thinking, speaking, and or acting and who must depend on a man or women for help in each and every area of activity including economics, education, entertainment, labor, law, politics religion, sex and war."

So, we are not talking about the number of candles on a birthday cake but a level of maturity.

This is especially important to study when you have 40 year old artists signing with record companies that cater to teeny boppers or doing duets with rappers who are young enough to be their sons. Recently, both Busta Rhymes and Mystikal have signed with YMCMB (Young Money Cash Money Billionares). Unfortunately, the youth are having a greater impact on the elders than the elders are having on the youth.

Just look at the complexity of Busta Rhyme's lyrics 2O years ago when he was with the Leaders of the New School as compared to his recent work, proving that you can have a sick, supersonic, 60 -bars- a -second flow and still say absolutely nothing of substance. If you you don't believe me, just go back and listen to his verse on the LONS's joint, Understanding The Inner Minds Eye (TIME), where he spits "it's kinda ill when you don't know what time or whose time you are living in" and compare it with his song with lil Twist. I rest my case.

Although, Knowledge is infinite, when time is out of whack, ignorance becomes infinite and regression becomes perceived as progression. So rappers that spit ignorance are seen as hot but those who drop knowledge are seen as "old school" even though they may be a decade younger than the dudes propagating ignorance.

The worst example of the imbalance in Hip Hop is the scandal that broke last month when 40-something year old rapper , Too Short, gave a video interview teaching boys who haven't even entered puberty how to mack the lil honeys. According to Dr. William Grier and Dr. Price Cobbs in their work, Black Rage, this imbalance stems from the pressures that Black males are "seen as the ultimate in vitality and masculine vigor " but at the same time are "regarded as socially, economically and politically castrated in performing every other masculine role." And the inability to deal with this contradiction is handed down from older males to the younger generation.

Like most other social problems, the arrested development of Hip Hop is not by accident. According to The Black Dot, former member of the 80's Hip Hop group, Tall, Dark and Handsome and author of the underground book , Hip Hop Decoded, Hip Hop has been made stagnant by design and hasn't moved forward in the last ten years."

Could it be that the "powers that be " have developed a program to manipulate time in order to stop the social, economic and political progression of oppressed communities?

Although the late writer, Del Jones, claimed that Hip Hop was stolen by "culture bandits" the fact is that the genre is a victim of something even more sinister; time bandits.

Michael Bradley, author of The Ice Man Inheritance, has a theory called "the Cronos complex," which is man's attempt to control time in order to retard the development of future generations. Bradley wrote that western man has created various mechanisms to "hold the future back, to limit their offspring's access to progress" and to" hurt the future, cripple it with casualties and thereby compromise its ability to surpass them."

As Dr. Carter G. Woodson wrote in The Mis-Education of the Negro, "once you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions." So those who control the economics of not only the music industry but the entire planet don't have to worry about grown men and women with child-like mentalities ever challenging the current socio-economic order. Even if rappers become billionaires they will just waste their money on buying bigger toys.

Regardless of who caused the stagnation of the culture, Hip Hop needs to grow up.

While some may disagree with placing a retirement age on rappers, we must place a limit on the dissemination of ignorance. We need a new rule in Hip Hop that says that no rapper over 30 should, ever, ever be allowed on the set of 106 and Park. Or at least we should start some Rites of Passage program for rappers.

If not we will be headed for an odd future where grown men continue to exhibit mindless behaviour.

Like the Wu Tang Clan said on A Better Tomorrow..

"You can't party your life away, drink your life away, smoke your life away...cuz your seeds grow up the same way."

TRUTH Minista Paul Scott's weekly column is "This Ain't Hip Hop," a column for intelligent Hip Hop headz. He can be reached at info@nowarningshotsfired.com His website is NoWarningShotsFired.com Follow on Twitter @truthminista

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

"Can't win a debate so they sponsor every threat to me/ I wonder if Agent 800 is standing next to me"

Young Lords- Immortal Technique

During a recent panel discussion, Hip Hop artist, Knowledge the Revelator, was just about to expose the diabolical plot of how they are using rap music to dumb down the masses. Suddenly, Alfred Jenkins aka "King Alfred" pimp slapped the person sitting next to him, which started a brawl that, abruptly, ended the conference. While fists and chairs were flying, Jenkins, quietly, exited through a side door where he was met by a man in a black suit and sunglasses, who handed him an envelope addressed to "Agent Rex 84..."

Last month, the Associated Press reported that Muslim students at "a dozen campuses in the Northeast" were being spied on by the NYPD. Coincidentally, around the same time, the NY Confidential website released a report that alleged that a 2008 meeting of Rev. Al Sharpton's National Action Network was also infiltrated by the NYPD following the trial of the police officers who killed Sean Bell.

Although it came as a shock for some, the "Alphabet boys" (as Young Jeezy would say) have long sent snitches into organizations; both criminal and political.

One of the earliest rats to infiltrate a Black organization was James Wormley Jones (Agent 800), who spied on Marcus Garvey and the UNIA during the 1920's. According to a February 11, 2011 article posted on the FBI website, "A Byte Out of History," other agents assigned to the UNIA included, Earl Titus, Authur Lowell Brent and Thomas Leon Jefferson. Also, according to the PBS documentary, "Marcus Garvey: Look for Me in the Whirlwind" one of Garvey's closest associates, Herbert Boulin, "owner of a Harlem based Black doll company, " was an informant known as "Agent P-138"

Later, Civil Rights organizations came under scrutiny by the Feds.

More than a decade ago, researcher Steve Cokely, shed light on a March 21, 1993 "Memphis Commercial Appeal" article that accused the NAACP's former board chairman, Joel Spingarn of being a major in the Military Intelligence Division, who, "used his post to obtain critical information for MID, such as a list of the organization's 32,000 members. "

The same newspaper also reported in a September 12, 2010, article that noted civil rights photographer, Ernest Withers, was not only an FBI informant but took the pictures at the scene of the Martin Luther King assassination.

It is more widely known that the Black Panthers and other "militant" movements of the late 60'-early 70's were heavily infiltrated by informants such as William O'Neal, who supplied intel to the Feds that led to the murder of Fred Hampton" and BOSS (Bureau of Special Services) agent, Eugene Roberts, who, not only was spying on Malcolm X when he was assassinated but, according to John Potash in his book "The FBI War on Tupac Shakur and Black leaders," was later an original member of the New York Chapter of the Black Panther Party of which Tupac's stepfather and mother were also members.

Although, Tupac Shakur inherited the legacy of government persecution from Mutula and Afeni Shakur , he was just one in a long line of rappers from NWA to the Wu Tang Clan under investigation by the Feds. Back in 2000, Cedric Muhammad of Blackelectorate.com began releasing a series of "Rap COINTELPRO" articles exposing this fact.

So why would federal and local law enforcement agencies still be interested in a music that has become increasingly apolitical since the early 90's?

According to Supreme Understanding, author of "How to Hustle and Win," "Hip Hop is just a euphemism for the Black and Brown underclass." The author who also released the widely circulated guideline, "How to Spot an Agent," also said, "Hip Hop is not as apolitical as people think. Many mainstream artists have a political element."

Perhaps the most detailed evidence of law enforcement's attack on Hip Hop is the first hand report of the the NYPD's "first Hip Hop cop," Derrick Parker. The book mentions the infamous "Hip Hop binder" that the Miami police used to keep files on Hip Hop artists as well as other surveillance activities against New York rappers.

What is not often mentioned is that, although, Parker was primarily assigned to watch rappers, he also tailed the late Black nationalist, Dr. Khalid Abdul Muhammad, whose voice was sampled on early Public Enemy, Ice Cube and Tupac Shakur songs. This is proof that you don't have to be a criminal nor a Hip Hop superstar to be under the watchful eyes of the Alphabet Boys.

Just as the FBI used the techniques that it developed fighting the mob during the '30's on activists during the Civil Rights Era they have used the same techniques that they use to go after drug dealers on Hip Hop artists of today.

This has raised a lot of questions that always go unanswered.

Since, according to John Potash, a FBI agent was present when Biggie Smalls was murdered, why didn't he stop the bullets? Also, with so much government surveillance going on, how can the Feds catch rappers like T.I. with guns but not see the trucks that are hauling them into the 'hood. And if they can catch members of street crime families trafficking drugs, how can they miss the planes and ships that are bringing them into this country?

This actually goes back to the Civil Rights era when activists asked if the FBI had so thoroughly infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan, why were civil rights workers still being murdered? The flimsy answer given, then, that they were an "investigative" unit not a "preventive" unit, I suppose, still applies today.

The mistrust of law enforcement leaves the 'hood caught in the middle between those who do dirt and hide behind the "anti-snitch" attitude of the streets and law enforcement agencies that refuse to admit why the "stop snitchin' " code was created in the first place.

If we are going to stop crime in the 'hood we must first have an honest conversation about government surveillance and its ramifications.

But until then, as GZA said on "I Gotcha Back"

"I gotcha back but you best to watch your front/because it's the brothas who front/they be on a hunt."

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

In today's news, there was a double homicide in the Bronx, yesterday, involving two fifth grade students at PS 187. After heated words, gunfire was exchanged leaving both children mortally wounded. Though first thought to be a result of bullying , it was later discovered that the killings were a result of an argument over who was the greatest rapper of all time; Tupac Shakur or Biggie Smalls. More news at 11:00...

On March 9, 1997, the murder of Christopher Wallace aka The Notorious BIG sent shock waves across a Hip Hop nation still mourning the death of rival rapper Tupac Shakur, months earlier. Wallace's death was followed by pledges to stop the violence, not only in Hip Hop, but in 'hoods across America. There were numerous conferences and rallies with people declaring that never again would a life so full of promise be wasted.

The final outcome fifteen years later... epic fail.

The senseless violence that plagued this country during the 90's is still prevalent and many will argue that the problem has gotten progressively worst. With the growing popularity of social media (Twitter, Youtube, etc) the 'net is flooded with videos of people beatin' each other's brains in. In 2012, every kid with an IPhone can become a ghetto Don King.

Although the focus in the media today is on "bullying," this term does not, adequately, address the drama that is going on in the streets. While it is popular to do a psycho-analysis of Lil Billy from the 'burbs who was picked on so much that he marched into his school cafeteria, one day, and started blastin', rarely do we ask what makes Lil Tyrone from Compton carry a gloc and shoot up the block on the regular. This type of behavior is just accepted as a cultural norm, especially in the world of Hip Hop. Like Cyprus Hill said back in the day , "Here is something you can't understand/ how I can just kill a man."

There have been rivalries in Hip Hop since the beginning. Many can remember the classic battles between Kool Moe Dee and Busy Bee or the Cold Crush Brothers and Dr. Rock and the Force MC's. Even during the era of "Hip Hop unity" there were ideological rifts between KRS One and members of the X-Clan and Ice Cube and Common. However, except for instances such as BDP throwin' that PM Dawn dude off the stage, these rivalries rarely led to violence.

However, by the mid 90's, the entertainment and other industries began to realize that beefs were extremely profitable for selling, not only murda music, but on a deeper level, guns and ammunition. Not to mention supplying the prison industrial complex with an endless source of funding. This is why many people consider the East Coast/West Coast beef that resulted (at least on the surface) in the deaths of Hip Hop legends Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls the result of a well thought out marketing scheme that went right.

This is not , merely, some some conspiracy theory, either.

In his autobiography, "My Infamous Life," Prodigy of Mobb Deep claimed that an associate once told him that the infamous shooting of Tupac at a NY recording studio that kicked off the deadly East Coast /West Coast beef was an attempt by Shakur "to start controversy" and use "Biggie and Puff" to "turn his gunshot wounds into marketing and promotion."

More recently, R@B legend Chaka Khan told CNN that a manager once told her that she was "worth more dead to him than alive." If this can be said about a musical icon, think about how much more dispensable are the lives of Hip Hop artists who are viewed as easily replaceable common street thugs.

Since, Hip Hop is dominated by African American males, the stereotype of Black youth as violence prone animals only heightens the folklore and commercial appeal of "beefs."

Although Biggie once defined "beef" as " when you need two gats to go to sleep" that ain't necessarily so. In the bigger scheme of things real "beef" is bombing a country while they're sleep" But if your world view extends no further than your block , then the ultimate example of beef is Black men killing other Black men in the streets.

This is especially destructive when this ideology becomes embedded in the psyche of the youth.

According to Dr. Amos Wilson in his classic work "Black on Black Violence: The Psycho-dynamics of Black Self-Annihilation in the Service of White Domination," the Black on Black violent criminal hates in other Blacks those characteristics that he hates most in himself" and he "commits homicide to keep from committing suicide."

This is the type of logic (or lack thereof) that flows throughout Notorious BIG's cds "Ready to Die" and "Life After Death," as he weaved tales of murdering other Black men with lyrics about being "black and ugly as ever" and how teachers told him that he would "never amount to nuthin'"

So the question after seeing all the death and destruction in our communities over the last fifteen years is; why do we still glamorize this nihilistic mentality? Why are we more concerned with creating another "Frank White" than we are saving a "Christopher Wallace?"

As Dr. Na'im Akbar wrote in "Visions for Black Men," "if we spend all of our time studying the destitute, desecrated and destroyed then we'll end up with a destitute, desecrated and destroyed image of the Black man." He urged that "if we want to know how to survive, let's look at the image of those who did survive."

An example of survival is the one time lifer, Durham NC's, Mike "Poetic Mike" Anderson who went from serving a life sentence in prison to founding "Polished Souls," a movement to save young people from the streets.

However, for every Poetic Mike, there are hundreds of Christopher Wallaces who don't get second chances but wind up six feet under.

Whether you call it beefin', bullyin' or Black on Black violence, the cycle of self destruction in the 'hood must end.

Despite what the Notorious BIG said on his first hit, "Juicy, " the stereotype of a Black male misunderstood" ain't all good.

Paul Scott

Paul Scott

Paul Scott is a minister, writer, lecturer and activist. He has been a guest on talk shows around the world including Hannity and Colmes (Fox News), Fox News Live, Nachman (MSNBC), Hot 97 (NY), The Bev. Smith Show, Mancow Morning Show, Mike Medved Show, Russ Parr Morning Show, Mo in the Midday WVON (Chicago), Tom Pope Show (DC) Newstalk 1010 (Toronto) and SAfm (South Africa) discussing the issues of Rap,Race,Religion and Revolution. He has been interviewed by many newspapers including the New York Times, the USA Today, the Wall Street Journal and the Christian Science Monitor. Scott has lectured at universities across the country including West Virginia University, Clemson, Winston Salem State University and Illinois Wesleyan University. Scott was ordained a Baptist minister in 1998 he later went on to coin the phrase Afrikan Liberation Theology, which is "Black Liberation Theology for the 21st century." After forming the New Righteous Movement, Scott formed the Messianic Afrikan Nation in 2003. For more information contact (984) 377-2064 info@nowarningshotsfired.com or Twitter @NWSF